


deluge

by treescape



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Care dynamics, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Masters and Padawans, Qui-Gon Jinn Lives, The Clone Wars - Freeform, The Phantom Menace, lineage feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:02:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25651060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/treescape/pseuds/treescape
Summary: “You’ll always be my Padawan.”Three moments between Master and Padawan.
Relationships: Qui-Gon Jinn & Obi-Wan Kenobi
Comments: 44
Kudos: 291





	deluge

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tessiete](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tessiete/gifts).



> [tessiete](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tessiete) said: “SO here’s something else I didn’t know I needed PLATONIC SHARED SHOWERING.” Ultimately, this morphed into a slightly wider examination of the dynamics of care between Master and Padawan.
> 
> This is also loosely inspired by the following lines from Claudia Gray’s _Master & Apprentice_: “Qui-Gon kicked off his boots. Normally he left them in the center of the floor; it would be Obi-Wan’s job to look after his things. Tonight, however, he collected them under one arm. Apparently the duties of a Padawan were slowly being taken away.”

The talks on Argus stretch into the early light of dawn. By the time Qui-Gon returns to the suite of rooms assigned to them, exhausted Padawan in tow, the hours of negotiation cling with a physical weight.

“Go to bed, Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon says firmly when he sees his Padawan’s gaze drift towards his datapad, there where it sits on the low table by the windows. “Your memories will still be fresh enough to write your report after a few hours of sleep.”

“I’m not that tired Master,” Obi-Wan insists with all the stubbornness of his fifteen years, but Qui-Gon simply directs him towards the refresher with a gentle nudge. Obi-Wan is too diligent for his own good, sometimes. It is a quality that Qui-Gon must learn how to teach him to balance, without somehow corroding the heart of something so interior to him.

Once Qui-Gon is certain that Obi-Wan has taken his instructions to heart, he makes his way into his own room and collapses into bed. It occurs to him in the instant before he tumbles into full sleep that he hasn’t even taken his boots off.

When he wakes, it is to the sour taste of his own stale breath and a tangle of hair he should have braided before falling asleep. That’s all well and to be expected; it’s what he deserves for not taking the time to properly retire. What strikes him as odd is that his feet, while not cold, are certainly lighter than they should be.

After a moment, Qui-Gon realizes that his boots are no longer on his feet and that a blanket has been tucked loosely around his frame. The door to his room, which he faintly recalls leaving open, is closed.

When he pads out into the communal area of the suite, it is to find Obi-Wan curled up in a chair, eyes still circled with the shadows of a disrupted sleeping schedule, but otherwise clear and alert from hours of rest. The slant of light through the windows tells Qui-Gon that noon has nearly come.

Obi-Wan looks up from the datapad in his hands. The screen is tilted at an angle that just allows Qui-Gon to see the opening lines of a newly begun report.

Qui-Gon’s boots sit, shining with fresh polish, beside Obi-Wan’s near the door.

\---

There is no time to even begin getting settled before they leave again for Naboo, but Qui-Gon is well enough used to that. He makes no protest when Obi-Wan disappears aboard ship to store their packs in their quarters. If he takes his time making his way there himself, he will never admit to it.

Obi-Wan is gone by the time Qui-Gon palms open the door. The quarters are small for three people, even if one of them _is_ a nine-year-old boy, but they feel bigger than they should with his Padawan’s pointed absence. Perhaps it is for the best; there are things they should probably say to one another, but Qui-Gon doesn’t know how to say them. He cannot apologize for wanting to see the boy trained, but something about Obi-Wan’s apology sits wrong with him as well.

He feels something a little too uncomfortably like guilt.

Almost absently, Qui-Gon notices that his extra robe has been unfolded from his pack and hangs carefully on the wall, ready for use on the morrow, but he frowns to see that Obi-Wan has not done the same with his own. Obi-Wan’s small travel bag lies, closed and still full, against the thin pillow of a second bunk, as if staking a momentary claim.

With a care borne of years, Qui-Gon draws out his Padawan’s cloak. He feels the weave of the wool rough against his fingers and hangs it beside his own, where it belongs.

That night, Obi-Wan’s eye flicker to the pair of robes, and if he doesn’t say anything, the tension is his shoulders lessens a little as he gently sets his boots to one side of Qui-Gon’s.

\---

The Council sends Qui-Gon to Zandria with relief supplies for the 212th. It feels wrong to say that he takes the charge _eagerly_ —he will never agree with this war—but it eases something in his soul nonetheless.

He feels like a hypocrite to his bones. He has spent decades teaching his Padawans to be mindful of the present moment, but he doesn’t know how to let go of his own fears. He lies awake in the night and thinks of Obi-Wan, the precision of his limbs broken in battle. He thinks of Anakin, his exuberance frozen and quelled. His only solace, so infrequently granted, comes when the young one remains on Coruscant. Obi-Wan’s Padawan, of course, does not agree; she chafes to be always in the midst of combat. 

When she is, he thinks of a third body, tiny and fractured and alone.

Qui-Gon comes out of hyperspace in the immediate aftermath of the fighting, and lands with apprehension a dead weight in his stomach. But he finds Obi-Wan in the gardens of the recently defended palace, there in the early rose of morning, and a piece of Qui-Gon’s heart will endure another day. If Obi-Wan doesn’t look entirely sound, at least he is safe, for the time being. Qui-Gon can only hope that the same is true of Anakin, halfway across the galaxy in the Quellor sector. He doesn’t know if it is better or worse, when the two brothers are assigned to fight side by side. They complement each other, in so many ways; it is a balm when they can guard each other’s backs, twin pillars of blue against the night.

The thought that there are times he could lose them both in one conclusive battle is one that does not bear thinking about, but it haunts his hours anyway.

Obi-Wan’s limbs are stooped with fatigue, his armour stained and dull, and he is very predictably engaged in an argument with his Commander as to his own fitness to remain standing. Obi-Wan looks like he’s about to buckle to the floor, so Qui-Gon does the only logical thing and lifts Obi-Wan into his arms. Obi-Wan's weight is somewhat heavier than Qui-Gon is prepared for, limbs fitted with plastoid, but he balances himself easily enough.

Obi-Wan doesn't seem to be particularly impressed, but Cody gives him a grateful look and directions to the quarters that have been assigned to his wayward apprentice.

“Come, Padawan,” Qui-Gon says decisively as he makes his way inside. “It is time for you to rest.”

“I’m not a Padawan anymore,” Obi-Wan protests, and Qui-Gon will never understand how his voice can be so precise even when it is loose with exhaustion.

“You’ll always be my Padawan.” Qui-Gon presses his lips against Obi-Wan’s forehead, feels the warmth of skin beneath a tangle of hair. “Age, distance. The Trials. None of them can change that.” Obi-Wan will understand one day, Qui-Gon thinks, when Ahsoka has been Knighted.

They enter Obi-Wan’s quarters, and when Qui-Gon makes his way towards what looks to be a bedroom, Obi-Wan struggles. It takes a moment for Qui-Gon to realize that he isn’t so much trying to free himself as to alter Qui-Gon’s direction.

“I don’t want to fall asleep like this.”

Qui-Gon can’t exactly blame him, so he turns and finds the refresher. Obi-Wan will surely sleep better if he’s had a chance to clean, anyway.

When they reach the refresher, Qui-Gon surveys the Knight in his arms, but Obi-Wan’s robes are so caked with dirt and sweat that Qui-Gon finally just deposits Obi-Wan into the shower fully clothed. He manages to get Obi-Wan’s chest plate and gauntlets off, then his boots, and turns on the water. It will make it harder for Obi-Wan to remove his tunics, but Qui-Gon isn’t sure they’ll be coming off without a good soaking anyway.

For a several heartbeats, Qui-Gon hesitates, uncertain if Obi-Wan wishes him to leave. But Obi-Wan looks so forlorn, barely managing to stand beneath the spray in his increasingly bedraggled tunics, that Qui-Gon sheds his own long robe and boots and climbs into the shower as well. He angles their bodies so that he’s taking the brunt of the water, able to control how much of it strikes Obi-Wan, and begins the work of stripping the layers from his Padawan's limbs. He stands close, encouraging Obi-Wan to lean in as need be, and his hands are firm and light as his own clothing grows heavy.

Later, when Obi-Wan is asleep and Qui-Gon has peeled away his own drenched tunics, Qui-Gon makes his way back to the refresher and eyes the heap of wet clothing on the floor. He’ll take care of them in the morning, but for now, he bends slowly and then straightens with two pairs of boots in hand.

He polishes them carefully, methodically, and sets them side by side near the door.

When Obi-Wan sees them the next morning, he doesn’t say a word, but his smile rivals the dawn.

**Author's Note:**

> Qui-Gon carrying Obi-Wan is inspired by amazing art by [orientalld](https://orientalld.tumblr.com/), which can be seen [HERE](https://tree-scapes.tumblr.com/post/626354953590652928/i-commissioned-this-gorgeous-piece-from-the).
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! I'm [treescape](https://treescape.tumblr.com/) on tumblr.


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